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Easy Peasy, Crop It, Pleasy!

Mary here, with another ALP Tutorial! Cropping images basically an image adjustment that allows you to better frame a subject, or take out all of that “extra” stuff in an image. We’re providing this tutorial so that our lovely clients can gain a little more knowledge on the DIY side of business. Not every logo is going to fit perfectly square on the digital canvas that we provide, and this will ensure you know how to crop an image to better fit the space you need it for! Sometimes, you can crop an image on your phone or in an app, but we’re going to be focusing on doing this on your computer. We’ll be using the amazing Photoshop to show you how to do this, and PicMonkey — we’re not affiliated with either entity and we don’t get any kick-backs for blogging them. We think that Photoshop is great for clients that already have knowledge on how to use the program, and PicMonkey is great for clients that have little to no editing/software knowledge. They both get the job done!

So, something to keep in mind when you’re cropping is where and what you’re cropping for. If you’re cropping for your website, you’ll want a different size than, say, a grid set up or for a tile on Instagram. Make sure you look at your size options and what they’re asking for so you don’t end up with a stretched image or the inability to upload. (As a side note, check out our image resizing post — it will also be helpful information alongside cropping images!)

Photoshop

Let’s start with Photoshop — the keyboard shortcut for crop is c — any time you press that while in Photoshop, you’ll end up with the Crop tool. Red indicates where the Crop tool is at, and the setting that are important. Original Ratio and the corner bar — this is how you’ll move to crop.

Next, you can adjust your crop ratio, or just leave the original. If you don’t choose a pre-determined ratio, you can adjust the size of the box by using the corners, or even dragging the crop box by the thick bars on each of the edges.

Next step, adjust the ratio, move the grid where you’d like it — click the check mark and you’ve done it, you’ve cropped your image.

Don’t forget to save as a separate image from your original file so you don’t lose that. You can use stock photos for all sorts of crops which is great use of an image from a header on a blog to a tile on social media. Succulents are great for relaxing or clean presentations, I’m fond of using them myself!

Now, PicMonkey!

When you open your image to edit in PicMonkey, Basic Edits is the first thing that’ll pop up. This is where it gets pretty quick and simple. Right there at the top is Crop, that’s it. We’ll click that and get to work.

A grid will appear and you’ll have the ability to adjust or SCALE your ratio on the left. It’ll start by showing you the original size right there on the left. This is when knowing where your image is going comes in handy, if it needs to be a certain size, pop in those numbers there. Height is on the left and width is on the right, generally.

Oh, SNAP! Taking Better Pictures, with your phone

Mary here, with another ALP Tutorial! Sometimes when I’m searching across the internet, looking for a new shirt, coffee cup or anything, I come across pictures for daysss! Product photography is super important. Presentation is everything and the way the shop presents their product. BUT, product photography can make or break a sale. Bad product photography can be a total turn-off and might keep people from clicking that “buy” button.

You being here means you’re investing in showing your product to the best of your ability and I admire that. We’ll make this as simple as possible, easy as possible and quick. We want to show you that it’s entirely possible to have decent product photography without investing in thousands of dollars of equipment, or elaborate set-ups. While we do recommend hiring a professional for the best results possible, this isn’t feasible for everyone — we’re all business owners on a budget, right?!

All images in this post are totally un-retouched, straight from an iPhone — this is important because we want you to see that it’s totally possible to work with what you’ve got!

Appearance and Light.

Appearance and light are the two key elements that will make your product photography amazing. It’s so easy! And with your phone, wha wha!

Appearance, clean, neat and clutter free. Depending on what your product is will play a huge role in how you go about this. Make sure you pay attention to what is behind your products. Take some time to clear a space (near a window, that’s where light will come in) or near decent lighting (avoid flash — we’ll get to that) and consider what products you’re selling and look at it as if you’re a client for your own display. Would you like it, would it appeal to you? Clean, white. Add a bit of greenery (I went simple to show you but it doesn’t need to take much or less) or even a few pieces to compliment what you’re showing. All of this thought can really make your product sell itself. Let your products sell themselves.

Look at what is behind your product. Make sure if something is behind your product, find a way to block it out. Background clutter is distracting, so if you can’t find a clear space to take photos in, find a way to cover up what is behind your product! A blanket or a poster board would be sufficient. Keep it clean. No clutter. No darkness.

There are a lot of options for a set-up. If you’ve got a nice counter, some pieces of wood. Outdoor space. Whatever compliments your product.

You can definitely use whatever works for you, the key is to give your product the best representation and best quality with your PHONE! Boom diggity.

Lighting. This is the key to success. The rest is just the frosting on the cake. So when you’re shooting, there are several options for light sources. We’re going with free and limitless. Natural light. I like to use the windows that face west, they tend to get good light until the evening. You don’t want shadows, harsh light or spots of different light. So take a look when you put your product down and give it a once over to make sure it’s all in decent light.

I use the board, on a table, in my kitchen. Which brings me to casting, color casting. Avoid red/blue/black or anything that’ll cast on to your product. The white board really helps to keep that from being an issue as you can see with the light yellow kitchen.

Place your product facing you, with the light to your left/right side. Don’t place your product with the light behind you, side or even in front if necessary. When you position and take a photo, make sure you don’t place your image to close that it isn’t fully visible. Take a little step back and it’s okay if you might need to drop and adjust, you can do that on your phone easily too. Tap your image, check your light, you can adjust it up or down to make sure you get the best quality of your product. Ta da. Click click!

Image Composition. Remember to compose your image in a sensible way, too! Don’t do that weird camera tilt thing that you think looks artsy, and make sure that your entire product is displayed in the image, unless you are pulling in tight on your subject to show off a special detail. If your image isn’t straight, there are ways of straightening the image using the tools available to you right on your phone!

So, check this out… BAD images:

And then, with a few little adjustments and following the advice we’ve given you… a BETTER image!

The biggest thing is to think like a prospective client. Would you purchase that item the way it is shown in the images? If you can say yes to this, you’re good to go!

Would you like to resize that?

Yes, yes you would! And why would you want to resize it? Oh, any number of reasons. Optimization, fitting a specific pre-determined space…etc. Oh! And saving you money!

Bigger is not always better. We provide our logo files in large format, with a resized file — this ensures you have top quality files on hand for your needs, whether it’s websites, printing, signage, social media, and so on. But, the files we provide won’t always fit perfectly for every single application…and let’s face it, if we provided files like that, we’d be spending all day prepping them for you! While we’re thrilled to design additional materials for you, we thought that it might be handy to know how to resize files on your own — save you time, $$, and you’ll become more adept at managing your own branding — fabulous all around, darling!

Uploading the wrong size files will take up space, it’ll make your website lag, or people won’t see things the way you’re hoping that they’ll see them. Or, you might even experience some sort of file distortion or icky compression — not good or pretty! We want to help you with that, so we’re going to give you a quick tutorial on resizing in Photoshop…and for those of you without PS access, PicMonkey! Something for everyone!

Photoshop

Let’s start with Adobe Photoshop — not affiliated with Adobe in any way, by the way — just our go-to for making beautiful things for you!

Go ahead and open your image. This beauty is from the lovely Pink is My Favorite Color set, just released yesterday, and will work great to show you how to resize stock images too!

Go to Image

Down to Image Size

The window that opens will give you some options, I typically resize in pixels so 800 x 800 (arbitrary numbers for the purpose of this tutorial), it’ll also adjust one side depending what you need. As long as you keep it fixed, so if you need it small vertically or horizontally. Locking the proportions can be done by making sure that little link icon is clicked.

This is where you decide what size, which will depend on where you’re putting your image. Pretty easy peasy for Photoshop.

Just another tidbit of info for you — if you’re saving a resized file for website/social media go to EXPORT under file and “save to web” — this’ll keep things nice and clean from web sharing.

PicMonkey

Now, let’s talk about the other option, PicMonkey. We’re also not affiliated with PicMonkey in any way — we simply find that among browser-based editing programs, it’s easily accessible and it’s easy to learn. These are two very important things business owners on the go that don’t have time to deal with learning Photoshop, which can be really daunting.

So step 1, if you’re using PicMonkey, sign up and create an account. If you plan to make resizing, or any image editing a habit, you’ll be happy to have an account so that perhaps you can keep some of your projects organized.

Next, this is where we click Edit a photo, then it’ll prompt that create an account, and you’ll end up over here at this screen…

Then, “Open New” and choose where you want to grab the image you want to resize — I’m choosing Computer, since that’s where I have my images. Going to just snag one of the files from the pink stock set (these are perfect to resize for all sorts of needs).

Alright, we’ve got slider open (it’s the little line/dot that’s blue) you can crop, rotate, sharpen and boom, RESIZE the last one with the cookie cutters.

When you resize, check out what the source wants for best image quality. 800 is a decent size, it’ll load quickly and stay sharp.

After this, you go up by Open new, then SAVE. You have resized and now saved your file for use.